Guilt to Gratitude

I have worked hard for the last 15 years of my life or so to keep guilt at bay. But never has it been harder than these last few months.

Guilt is such a waste of energy. It is a turning inward of anger, frustration and helplessness. It is a self-involved lens that combines two very opposite seeming ideas: I am all-powerful, and I am no good. It implies that there was choice, effort or pre-determination that all worked towards a bad end. And it is all a mental construct - it is my thoughts about what I am feeling, which is really anger and sadness, along with the human drive to find explanations and causes for everything.

These last couple of months, with the mega-flare I've been experiencing, and my old classroom pretty much crashing and burning, and with all the ripple effects both of these situations have had, it has been very very hard not to look for cause and effect and find at the center of it all my illness. I have not said that I am ill in quite some time. I know now that I am safe to say so without falling into the trap of focussing on the negative. But there it is.

Stairs and Swelling

The last couple of days have been amazingly good, in terms of my energy levels, and mood. I feel like things are coming back together for me, and I could not be more pleased. However. The last few days have also brought on an eczema flare like I haven't had in 8 years.

I woke up on Monday, and my ears were a little itchy. Then in the afternoon, so were my hands, and my cheeks a little. And then the red splotches appeared. In what I can only imagine was a mis-guided effort, I iced one of my cheeks last night, because it was burning. When I woke up this morning, I could barely see out of that eye, it was so swollen.

In the meantime, this week, I have had some really great moments; I surprised myself by making it all the way up the stairs in one go, I went home, I did some pre-packing for the trip to Cali, and I even brainstormed with my Mom on school stuff.

Springing Forward

I'm not sure if it's the sleep I'm finally getting, the weather brightening up, the longer hours of daylight, the fresh air I can finally start getting again, or a wonderful combination of all of the above, but I am feeling moment of actual (relative, please understand, it's still relative), refreshment. Aah.

My mood has lifted, and that always changes everything. Once again, I have managed to steer clear of a full-blown depression, but the last few months, as you will know if you've been following the little I have written, have been rather difficult and dreary. It has taken much turtling (a few of us spoonies came up with this evocative comparison in conversation to describe when we make like turtles - see the turtle, feel the turtle, be the turtle - go slow, and hide in your shell if you have to), escapism, conversations, exploration of my psyche, and surrender to evade the darker moods, but I am happy now to be writing from the other side.

Mold update...

It's been a while again... I guess there has been so much going on, and getting the keyboard set up with the tablet somewhere comfortable is not as easy as I thought it would be...

But today, I was debating whether to take a shower or go for a walk (and as my Mom said, it sucks that it's actually a choice I have to make), and I decided instead, to put my afternoon's energy into this. And so I am sitting outside, blogging!

I brought out one of the little kiddie chairs, and an old (clean!) changing pad, and I'm sitting on the ground, and the tablet/keyboard are on the chair in front of me. Much less expenditure of energy than going up the stairs to my mom's computer, and I get fresh air to boot! Yeehaw!

Updates: mold, naturopath, California, sleep

So long since I've written, and in part because there is much and yet little going on.

There is little going on in terms of my physical and emotional condition; I am still fatigued, malaised, in discomfort etc etc. I am still struggling with sleep. I am still dealing with the emotional fallout of this long relapse, and the discovery of mold.

Yes, that's the big news - we had people come in, and found high levels of mold in my basement, my bedroom, my parents' basement, and to a lesser extent my living room and the bedroom in which I sleep at my parent's house. Joy oh joy. It's not like we already had enough to deal with. And I'm so glad I can say "we" instead of "I".